Ali Cem Dağlı
Technical Manager of Alapala Feed Tech

In Feed Mills, %70 of the total energy is consumed by the Pellet mill and Hammer mill.

Pellet Mill

With a drastic value of 40% of the total energy consumption of a feed mill, a Pellet mill consumes lots of energy. Yet, lack of awareness towards using Pellet mill to its maximum efficiency causes energy losses. To prevent these losses, the first thing that should come to mind must be steam quality. A steam boiler used at low pressure and low temperature consumes more fuel. The reason is that condensed steam leaves water in the system, preventing the passage of steam and entering the conditioner, wetting the feed. In short, complete vapor formation cannot be achieved. In addition, many factors such as fine grinding in the hammer mill, oil quantity added in the mixer, circumferential speed of the pellet mill die, pelleting ratio, die hole opening and pellet hardness affect energy efficiency.

Hammer Mill

Hammer mill follows the Pellet mill with 30% of the total energy consumption of a feed mill. Lately, efforts are being made towards reaching higher capacities by using more motor power as the decreases in the particle sizes reduced the Hammer mill capacities. These recent changes made energy efficiency one of the critical criteria in the Hammer mill design. The use of raw materials with low moisture content, the use of roller mills and sieves before the hammer mill, the design of the grinding chamber as the circumferential speed of the hammer mill, the beater-sieve spacing, the duration of time the feed stays in the grinding chamber and the mill aspiration system needs to be carefully considered.

Maintenance

Cleaning, lubrication, repair, and maintenance of all the machines and correlated systems such as the aspiration system of the feed mill must be carried out periodically. For feed mills older than 15, machinery revisions are crucial, and to get the most out of these investments, the latest technology machinery with higher energy efficiencies must be selected. In particular, more intelligent machinery with higher sensor usage should be selected, if not, usage of the sensors within the feed mill must be increased as these sensors would allow us to gather the vibration output of the machinery in the system, and the integration between sensors and mechanical parts should be ensured with renewed automation systems. Nowadays, the use of frequency controls has become widespread. We know that frequency controls are expensive in the initial investment, but this investment can be amortized with energy efficiency in a short time. It must be also noted that energy efficiency could be also achieved by using high-efficiency motors and also decreasing the requirement for manpower.

Besides the factors we mentioned above, many more steps could be taken to increase energy efficiency. We pointed out and summarized the most crucial factors. As Alapala Feed Tech, we meticulously gather all the necessary data from our customers in each Project and each single machine sale so that we can make precise calculations for each unique scenario. And, each experience we gain becomes another stepping stone in our R&D studies to reach greater levels in customer satisfaction.

About Alapala 

Alapala is one of the leading global machinery producers and turnkey solution providers in food processing technologies since 1954. The company has proven expertise in turnkey projects with 1000+ references in 5 continents and over 120 countries across the globe.  Today Alapala builds integrated plants for the grain, feed, and pasta processing industries. Alapala aims to be one of the leaders of the feed milling industry with its focus on research and development of feed milling technologies with the Alapala Feed Tech brand.